A Chinese wet market is a covered hall of individual stalls, each rented by a trader selling one category of food: vegetables, pork, beef, chicken, live fish and shellfish, tofu and soy products, noodles and dumplings, pickles and preserved goods, rice and grains, fruit, and often a section of cooked food sold by weight. Shanghai's version is generally cleaner and better organised than visitors expect, with tiled floors, drainage channels, fluorescent lighting and prices posted above each stall. Coming early in the morning is the best way to see one working.
What is on the stalls
The fish section is the most alive part: tanks and basins of carp, eel, prawns, crabs, clams and the small river fish that Shanghai cooks prefer, kept swimming until the moment of sale and killed, scaled and gutted while you wait. The vegetable stalls follow the season closely - shepherd's purse and bamboo shoots in spring, lotus root and water bamboo in summer, hairy crab and taro in autumn, salted greens and cured pork in winter. Alongside are the prepared foods that make a Shanghai breakfast: steamed buns, soy milk, fried dough sticks, rice rolls and congee, sold from the front of the market or from shops just outside it.
Eating and buying
You do not need to cook to make use of a market. Many stalls sell cooked food by weight - braised pork, smoked fish, pickled vegetables, roast duck, cold noodles - which you can buy and eat at a small table on the spot or take away. Fruit is cheap and excellent in season. If you are staying somewhere with a kitchen, a market is also the best place to assemble a meal: noodles, greens, a piece of fish and a jar of sauce will cost a fraction of what the same ingredients cost in a supermarket.
Practical notes
Markets open early, often by half past five in the morning, and the fresh fish and best vegetables are gone by nine; most close by early evening. Payment is normally by mobile, though most traders will take cash. Take your own bag, be prepared to point rather than explain, and do not handle the produce yourself - tell the trader what you want and let them select and weigh it. Most neighbourhoods have one within a few minutes' walk, so ask at your hotel rather than travelling across the city to a famous one.
